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Principal Figgins
Figgins is the Indian-American principal of William McKinley High School and has been for 19 years. He is portrayed by Iqbal Theba. Biography Figgins is the principal of William McKinley High School, a job that he takes very seriously. Although sometimes appearing unreasonable and a cheapskate, Figgins honestly has the students' best interest at heart, so long as it doesn't cost the school too much money. He used to work for Mumbai Airlines, filming in-flight safety videos. He is highly religious, as seen in "Showmance". 'Season 1' Principal Figgins works as the head of William McKinley High School. He is also in charge of handling the school's budget. As a result of constantly worrying about the school funding, Figgins comes off as unnecessarily cheap with the money. At the start of the series, Figgins is uneasy about the idea of allowing Will Schuester to restart the Glee Club, particularly after having to fire the previous teacher Sandy Ryerson, who had been caught by Rachel Berry touching a male student inappropriately. However, Will argues his case, and Figgins agrees that if Will can form a group that will win Regionals, he will allow the club to continue. If the group fails, it will disband. Sue Sylvester, who runs the school's cheerleading group the Cheerios, becomes infuriated at Figgins taking money away from the Cheerios budget for the Glee Club, thus sparking Sue's hatred of the group and her constant scheming to have the group destroyed. Although Figgins does not particularly like Sue, he does seem more inclined to believe her and trust her judgment, due to the fact that she has brought the school a great deal of glory and prestige. However, Sue starts to damage their arrangement, when she blackmails him by saying she will post an embarrassing video of him doing a sock commercial for Mumbai Airlines on YouTube if he doesn't do as she says, such as rehiring Sandy as the school's head of arts. In the end this plan fails as Figgins puts the ad online himself, and gets a lackluster response to it. Figgins almost ends the Glee Club at the end of Mattress when the Glee kids do a commercial. The company, in gratitude sent the kids a set of mattresses, which was considered payment and took away their amateur standing. Mr. Schuester however took the blame for getting the mattresses, and as a result he was fired from the Glee Club. Later in Sectionals, Will would be rehired after Figgins discovered that Sue, in an attempt to again destroy the Glee Club, had given the Sectionals setlist to the opposing schools. As a result, he suspends Sue for 5 months, much to Will's thanks, who is then rehired as the Glee Coach. In "Theatricality", it is revealed Figgins believes Tina Cohen-Chang is a vampire (he believes that vampires actually exist) based on her gothic style of dress, so he orders her to find a new style. Later in the episode, Tina successfully pretends to be a vampire in order to threaten Principal Figgins into letting her dress how she wants. In Funk, Figgins plans on expelling Puck and Finn after they slashed the tires of Vocal Adrenaline's Range Rovers, but Shelby tells him that she does not want Puck and Finn expelled. After Shelby, Finn, and Puck agree that Puck and Finn will get jobs to pay for the damages, Figgins hits on Shelby complimenting her on her attitude and her looks. This causes Shelby to walk out of his office. 'Season 2' In "The Substitute", Figgins gets sick due to Sue's scheming and Sue takes over as principal. Happy about Sue's stance on junk food (outlawing tots), the school board fires Principal Figgins and hires Sue as full-time principal. However, Sue announces in "Furt" that she is resigning to protest the removal of Karofsky's expulsion, allowing Figgins to return to his position. Personality Figgins, although at times hard headed and penny-pinching sounding, is by no means a bad guy in the school. For the most part he's a reasonable administrator whose chief concern is the smooth running of his school and what is best for the students. He also states that he wants a safe and stable learning environment for everyone in the school. Of course, if he can save money, he's more inclined to do that. Figgins does his best to make everyone happy, suggesting many compromises and for the most part offering people second chances, rather than just outright punishing them. It's revealed that he goes to therapy, which is why he's so willing to do this, as wants everyone to be nice to each other. He will often invoke his therapy in his administrative methods, such as making Sue and Will hug after they have a blow out argument. In "Theatricality", it is discovered that he has an irrational fear of vampires. He tells Tina not to dress in a goth fashion, so she tells him that if he does not let her dress like a goth, her father will bite him. Figgins is unfortunately easily bullied by Sue, who often uses blackmail to get what she wants. This usually plays into her favor for a period of time, until Figgins can at last build up the courage to take away her power. For example, a questionable video she got access to, he in the end put it on YouTube himself before she could. Another example is his willingness to confess to his wife about a supposed one-night stand with Sue, rather than let Sue use it as blackmail. Overall, Principal Figgins is caring about the school, staff, and students and pursues his passion – but his weak spot is that he is easily blackmailed by Sue and even Tina Cohen-Chang. Relationships Mrs. Figgins Mrs. Figgins is Principal Figgins' wife. She has not yet appeared in the show. Sue Sylvester Although they have not had an actual relationship, after being suspended, Sue took Figgins out to dinn er, with Figgins assuring her he wasn't going to back down about her suspension. Sue then proceeds to slip Figgins a date-rape drug into his champagne, after which he wakes up in bed naked, next to Sue, who then threatens Figgins to tell his wife about their 'night'. Whether she actually had sex with him is unknown. Sue has recently relinquished this blackmail in exchange for giving New Directions another year. Trivia *Has been Principal for 19 Years *Has been blackmailed twice by Sue Category:Characters Category:Staff Category:Supporting characters Category:Principal Figgins Category:Sue Sylvester Category:Asian American Characters Category:Minor Characters Category:Principal Category:William McKinley High Category:Minor Characters Category:Minority Category:Male Characters